After putting together my Pauper Gelectrode deck, I've been in the mood to play some Izzet. However, the Nivs are obvious and boring and I'm still not enthused by Melek, so I've turned to Nin to get my non-standard-deckbuilding on.

Pretty obvious. I didn't include Stuffy Doll because, while cute, it doesn't seem all that good here. I have no way to reset it once it dies and killing one player slowly does not seem all that difficult in an aggressive deck.

Pretty obvious. I didn't include Stuffy Doll because, while cute, it doesn't seem all that good here. I have no way to reset it once it dies and killing one player slowly does not seem all that difficult in an aggressive deck.

But, dealing damage to an opponent and drawing cards seems really, really good. Especially if one of the 2 cards you need is your general.

I have Mogg Maniac in there for that purpose. Stuffy Doll in particular seems bad because it's five mana for a 0/1 that can only burn out one player.

I dunno man, I think the doll is good enough that I'd be looking to slot in Crystal Shard or something so you can re-aim it. You've got enough ETB gobbos + metamorph that It'd still be useful beyond just the doll, and having something you can hit with Nin without diminishing your board is handy. Heck, once you start getting big mana, you can do stuff like activate Krenko, get a bunch of gobbos, bounce him, re-cast him and tap him again (assuming one of your haste enablers is active).

_________________"The President's job - and if someone sufficiently vain and stupid is picked he won't realize this - is not to wield power, but to draw attention away from it." -- Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide tot he Galaxy Radio Transcripts predicting the future.

I have Mogg Maniac in there for that purpose. Stuffy Doll in particular seems bad because it's five mana for a 0/1 that can only burn out one player.

I dunno man, I think the doll is good enough that I'd be looking to slot in Crystal Shard or something so you can re-aim it. You've got enough ETB gobbos + metamorph that It'd still be useful beyond just the doll, and having something you can hit with Nin without diminishing your board is handy. Heck, once you start getting big mana, you can do stuff like activate Krenko, get a bunch of gobbos, bounce him, re-cast him and tap him again (assuming one of your haste enablers is active).

Yeah, Stuffy Doll is super sweet in my Nin: Goblins deck. I run more clone effects so I can make more use of it but it's always fun to talk another player into attacking you with a fatty so you can block with a Stuffy Doll and damage someone else.

2) This is an aggro deck. Maniac costs two and attacks, Doll costs five and has zero power. Advantage: Maniac.

3) I'm not currently running any way to reset Stuffy Doll. The advantage is still to Stuffy Doll here, but it's much narrower since casting Stuffy Doll will make me an enemy and I won't have the flexibility to change Stuffy Doll's target later if the initial target stops being a relevant threat. Plus, actually burning someone out with Nin + Doll is a multi-turn process that requires me to spend a lot of mana per turn on activating Nin rather than casting more Goblins.

4) I'm running Purphoros. The need to hit my Doll multiple times is lessened by the fact that I can already do a ton of damage to people by just casting more men - and not just to one person, but the entire table. I don't exactly want to load up on this sort of effect since I want to be spending my mana casting guys and forcing them through every turn, and Stuffy Doll is a really bad guy outside of the specific context of Nin.

Where does Stuffy Doll shine? Against control players who make it hard to attack. Unfortunately, Nin - a two-mana 1/1 with no built-in protection - is very hard to keep alive against those same players. As an example, there's a Vish Kal player in my group who can very easily keep Nin off the table, at which point Stuffy Doll has a steep uphill battle versus a deck that usually has 60+ life. More haste effects may make Nin better against removal, but it's also worth remembering that Nin dying a bunch of times makes it harder to use her ability profitably on the turn you recast her. Paying six to get Nin into play doesn't really leave a lot of mana left over to feed into the X part of her ability (not to mention the UR in that activation). I am running more lands than normal, so I can make land drops late into the game, but I'm not convinced I want to run Stuffy Doll here over cards that do stuff.

All valid points. But if Nin isn't the focus of your deck, why play R/U? Seems there are better color combos for goblins. And if you don't really care about your general past the colors.. then it doesn't really matter.

Last edited by Rasalom on 2014-Mar-12 9:03 am, edited 1 time in total.

RU turns out to be pretty good for Goblins. Blue has some fun ways to abuse tokens and she gives some awesome card draw.

This, pretty much. My goal was to play an aggro deck in EDH. My theory was that aggro is not usually viable because the best colors for it are red and white, and those are also the two colors with the least card draw and thus the least ability to get back into the game after a sweeper or gas up in the midgame to kill a second or third player. Nin lets me sacrifice tokens to keep the pain train rolling.

Stuffy Doll is certainly great with Nin but is not so great within the Goblin aggro shell, so I decided to avoid it. Cards like Crystal Shard (though I would run Erratic Portal since it wouldn't require scarce blue mana) and Thousand-Year Elixir don't exactly work with the beatdown plan directly, but they help make tokens in greater volumes or at greater speeds, so I'm interested in trying them somewhere.

I probably should have been more clear about this in the OP, sorry about that.

I finally built this deck and managed to get some games in with it - or rather, with something close to the OP list (I'll post the full list in the morning). I won both games I played. Some notes:

- I couldn't find a Mogg Fanatic prior to sleeving up, but I actually didn't feel the need for it. The games I won came from aggro-ing people out with tons of Goblins.

- I initially thought 39 lands would be necessary to support Nin, but it might be too many. I'll try it again at 39 and then go down to 37 if I keep getting flooded.

- The token makers are the real heroes of this deck. Speaking of which, I need more M13 Goblin tokens...

With the haste and pump effects in the deck, it is not difficult to alpha strike people at 30+ life. Goblin Lookout is particularly good for this. Surprisingly, Legion Loyalist is also fantastic as both first strike and the anti-token clause are great in combination with pump effects.

The important update this time around is the reduction in land count in favor of artifact mana. The artifact ramp makes midgame Nin activations so much better, even though my creature curve is low enough to not really need it.

EDIT: This deck is barrels of fun to play and is very, very strong. I think I've finally found my EDH-viable aggro deck.

Still playing this deck, still enjoying it. A few things I've noticed, though:

1) Giving haste to Nin is absolutely huge. Most importantly, it allows her to dodge tuck effects since she can burn herself in response and head back to the command zone. Currently, only Boots and Urabrask give Nin haste, but I'd like to see if I can add Anger or something else along those lines.

2) For all its aggressive cards, this deck is deceptively good at playing the long game. Something like Mnemonic Nexus would probably help in this regard.

3) I could probably use some more card drawing that isn't Nin.

Opposition has not been all that remarkable. Typically it doesn't resolve or it triggers a Wrath amidst fears that I'll use it to lock down someone's manabase. The original intent behind the card was to use it as another Blustersquall, but I think the surprise factor is what makes that one good and Opposition lackluster. I also haven't been super impressed with Goblin Warrens, which is grossly inefficient even if it is a token maker. I might switch those to Anger and Nexus, respectively, and then try to find a way to wedge Mulldrifter in.